


Hopeless

by clicktrack_heart



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Angst, Emotional Manipulation, Episode: s02e12 Tome-wan, F/M, Jealousy, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-02
Updated: 2018-03-02
Packaged: 2019-03-25 20:56:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13842879
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clicktrack_heart/pseuds/clicktrack_heart
Summary: "Do you fantasize about killing me?” Will asks. "Yes.... among other things," says Hannibal (and still neither one gets what they want).





	Hopeless

**Author's Note:**

> Rusty as hell whoops, and unedited. It's been a long time since I've shared any writing, it's been a really rough year. But I was inspired by this [here](https://sirenja-and-the-stag.tumblr.com/post/170300751738/will-do-you-fantasize-about-killing-me-hannibal) gorgeous post from Sirenja and the Stag. 
> 
> Hope this is enjoyed. :)

_What if all these fantasies come rushing in at night?  
But it's just too far for the ancients to allow_

“Hopeless” -- Screaming Females

The fireplace crackles in the distance, its soft glow exquisite on Will’s face. It’s merely his voice that lacks warmth. Hannibal senses his indecision, the strain of Jack and the loss of Margot’s child not unlike a hurtling train coming towards both of them.

Hannibal can never be certain of what will emerge from the ruin. 

“You don't want me to have anything in my life that's not you,” Will says. 

“I'm your psychiatrist, Will. I only want what's best for you.”

“Please,” he mutters. “Every moment of cogent thought under your psychiatric care is a personal victory.”

Hannibal considers this. “You are applying yourself to my perspective as I've been applying myself to yours.”

Will closes his eyes. When he opens them, there’s a question there. Something that has been bothering him.

“You once asked me something,” Will says, taking a deep breath. “And now I want an answer from you. Do you fantasize about killing me?”

Hannibal smiles. 

It has occurred to him how beautiful Will would be as a corpse. In his mind palace, he imagines an avenging archangel with slit wrists, or perhaps, Will simply deconstructed in glass panels -- the better to admire from inside and out. Even the muralist’s unblinking eye had struck Hannibal as inspiration. Will, frozen in resin, bare to him and God alone. 

Even unsubstantial death would be so amorous, he thinks. Still, these thoughts do not occupy Hannibal as much as others.

“Yes,” he says. “Among other things.” 

Will’s surprise is a mere flicker of acknowledgement. Of course, Hannibal concedes, Will’s empathy would have allowed him to sense Hannibal’s attraction prior to this moment. He had never been _overt_ , but he had not taken great pains to hide it either. 

“Unbecoming of you, Dr. Lecter,” Will says, finally. 

“Because I am your doctor and you are my patient?”

“You aren’t my doctor,” Will says. “Not anymore.”

“Ah,” Hannibal says, wincing good naturedly. “Perhaps it is a question of your sexuality.”

“There is no question.” 

Hannibal raises an eyebrow. “Do you have any experience with men, Will? Perhaps when you were younger.”

To his credit, Will does not tense. His smile is brittle. It does not meet his eyes. 

“Not if you were the last person on earth.” 

Hannibal smiles back. He smooths an errant wrinkle in his pants. 

“I was under the assumption we agreed to honesty between us.”

“Here’s some honesty for you. I like women.”

“You like what you cannot have,” Hannibal says. He thinks of Will’s mother. The low hanging fruit. Then, thoughtfully, “Alana, Margot. How many others like them, Will?”

“Leave Margot out of this,” Will snarls. “You've done enough.”

“I did nothing to her.” 

Will sits back abruptly into his chair, showing his teeth. “Nothing.”

Hannibal reaches for his glass, deliberate. He swirls the wine, breathing in the bouquet of burnt cherry, plum and pepper. Nearly eleven miles away, Abigail waits in his attic, all alone save for her ghosts and nightmares.This is the child he will return to Will, the beginning of the life he will create for them. But he cannot speak of that. 

“Margot offered an opportunity,” he says instead. “One that could not be refused."

For a brief moment, Will’s anger softens in the half-light, nearer to bewilderment than ire. He looks away from Hannibal, staring into the fire. The flame still dances in the hearth, one endless, hungry coil. 

“I was lonely,” Will says. 

“Loneliness distorts our perceptions,” Hannibal offers. “Yet the solace and companionship of another person is what makes us who we are. More than flesh and bone.”

Though Hannibal can only see Will’s profile, he notes the way his mouth twists. “Is Alana your _companion_?” he asks, tone mocking. 

“She is a very pleasant interlude,” Hannibal answers. He samples his wine again. A new subtlety in flavor strikes him, the eye young but still impenetrable. He congratulates himself on his good taste. 

“And Margot, what is she to you?” he asks Will. 

“You know I’m not her type,” Will says wryly. “Don’t have the right equipment for her proclivities.”

“Was it difficult to perform, knowing this?”

Will looks away from the fire to Hannibal, eyes wide with sudden comprehension. 

“You want to hear how I fucked someone else?” 

“I see no reason to restrict our conversations. Do you?” 

Will snorts. 

“Fuck it,” he says. “And fuck you.”

He grabs the stem of his glass from the side table and abruptly downs its contents. Only a thin rivulet escapes his swallow, the wine leaking down his chin. He wipes his hand over his mouth before brushing it deliberately on Hannibal’s chair. 

Hannibal is charmed. 

“Sex with Margot went better than I think, either Margot or I expected,” Will says. “I guess you could say we were -- determined. Perhaps a product of your therapy.”

Hannibal shifts slightly in his armchair, a peculiar sensation forming in his gut. 

Will’s wine-stained lips curl. 

“She came to me. I didn't know why at the time, it didn't occur to me to ask. But she told me she trusted me. After Alana, that meant something. Am I enriching your fantasies, doctor?” 

“Those with empathy disorders can experience a myriad of sexual concerns or difficulties,” Hannibal replies, hesitating only a beat. “A lack of interest, difficulty maintaining an erection, or ejaculating.”

Will shrugs the stiff line of his shoulders. “How... clinical.” 

“For some, it is a betrayal,” Hannibal says. 

“I _performed_ fine.”

“Distracted, then.”

Will narrows his eyes. 

“The best part was when she was on top. It was good not being able to breathe. The feeling of being suffocated -- smothered-- by someone else other than you for one goddamn minute.” 

There is the slightest tremor in Will’s hand when he reaches for his glass before remembering it is empty. “You’re a fucking virus Hannibal, you find a way to infect everything.”

Hannibal rises without comment. He goes to his desk for the remnants of the Petrovaselo and replenishes Will’s glass. 

“For the virus, Margot provided the antidote,” he says. “A seduction.”

Will stares at Hannibal for a long moment. He wets his lips slowly, raising his glass. “What’s a little seduction between friends?” 

Hannibal frowns but mirrors him, tasting his own wine.

“There is no easy path between restraint and desire,” he says.

“No?” Will asks. He rubs absently across his neck. Hannibal finds himself tracking the motion, watching as Will undoes the first button of his shirt, revealing the smooth dip of his collarbone. 

“You are applying yourself to my perspective now,” Hannibal says. “Is that why you asked if I ever fantasized about killing you? To see me better, as I see you?”

Will smiles strangely. “Interesting,” he says. He flicks open a second shirt button, then another. “Jealousy must feel -- it feels strange for you. It's not your usual brand of emotions.”

“It pleases you,” Hannibal hears himself say. 

Will flushes. “Yes,” he says. “Yes.”

“Tell me then. What did you do?”

Will runs his hand slowly down his chest, to his navel, lost in thought and memory, the whirring, broken clockwork of his mind. 

“At first we compared our old wounds,” Will says, distantly. “I kissed Margot’s scars -- across her back and thighs -- there were too many.”

“Did she find your scars?”

“I showed her,” Will says, and then he does the same for Hannibal, tugging down the sleeve of his shirt to bare his shoulder. 

The circular entrance wound with its thick rim of abrasion is not new to Hannibal. After all, Jack Crawford had asked for his help to stop Will’s bleeding. Hannibal’s nostrils flare as he remembers the tainted, fevered scent of Will’s blood, the warmth of his limp body as he applied pressure to the wound. 

“What happened next?” Hannibal asks. 

“We kissed a lot,” Will says. He touches his lower lip, tracing the curve Hannibal has long memorized. “I don’t think either of us had done that in a while. Eventually we ended up in my bed and she pulled my head down between her legs. I went down on her for as long as she could stand it.”

“I am sure she appreciated that,” Hannibal says, with a bit more ice than he intended, recalling Margot’s taunt during their last session. 

Will makes a soft sound in the back of his throat. He looks at Hannibal with half-closed eyes, his hand dropping suggestively to the bulge in his pants. 

“She wanted to start off on top,” he murmurs. “As you know, there was no condom.”

Hannibal gives no reaction at the crude remark, forcing Will to continue. 

Almost lazily, Will unzips his pants, tugging the material down around his hips. Hannibal sees the hard line of his cock, the twitch of it underneath his undergarments. The smell of his arousal is thick in the air. He strokes himself through the fabric, watching Hannibal with black pupils. 

“But -- ah -- the further we went, the more _blurred_ things became, Dr. Lecter,” Will says, his voice high and breathy. 

It’s vulgar manipulation yet Hannibal is not offended. He is careful not to react. Will responds in kind by pulling his boxers down, exposing himself. His uncircumcised penis has always been lovely to Hannibal, the rosy pink coloring beset by the neat thatch of pubic hair, the delicate skin of his scrotum. 

Hannibal’s fingers twitch, torn with the urge to draw, to capture Will, or to touch, to close the punishing gap between them. The ache he felt earlier has now nestled somewhere in his chest. He folds his hands neatly in his lap.

“God,” Will says, tipping his head back so that Hannibal can see his throat. 

“Will.”

“It had been awhile since I felt that good,” Will continues, as if Hannibal hadn’t spoken at all. His hand moves faster on his cock, pearl pre-ejaculate leaking across the clutch of his fingers. 

“I thought about Alana too,” Will says, moaning softly. “She fills -- oh -- my thoughts even now.” 

Hannibal blinks. The insult reverberates like a slap against his teeth. The door of his mind opens and he sees Will inside the muralist’s creation again. Bare, helpless. The heat of arousal mixing with the clammy stench of the dead. Eyes to God. Eyes to Hannibal. 

“Do you need fear to reach orgasm, Will? Does it help your fantasies?” he asks. 

Will flushes sweetly.

“You don’t -- scare me,” Will says but his eyes dart from Hannibal’s, and Hannibal sees his shame. 

“Perhaps you thought of more than Alana while you were intimate with Margot.”

“No,” Will says, shuddering. His hand moves more violently. “I didn’t -- no.”

“Where did your empathy take you?” Hannibal asks, genuinely curious. “Yourself as me? Or as Alana? Were you with us, in my bedroom? Did we please you?” 

Will makes a pained expression. His horror is real. 

“I saw a beast. And -- I -- I _felt_ you.” 

Hannibal nods encouragingly. 

“Good, Will,” he says. “That’s very good.” 

At the simple praise, Will makes a choked sound. He writhes, cock pulsing against his hand as he comes. His shudders continue for nearly a full minute. 

Ignoring his own erection pressing against his pant seam, Hannibal stands. He pulls a handkerchief from his pocket to hand to Will. 

Will stares at him with haunted eyes. He takes the monogrammed linen, wiping away the semen on his hand and stomach. Hannibal busies himself at his desk, allowing Will a thin vestige of privacy. Soon, he hears Will’s chair scrape back. 

“You're right. We are just alike,” Will says quietly. “You're as alone as I am. And we're both alone without each other.”

Hannibal doesn’t turn as Will goes but his empty hands flex across the surface of his desk. Nothing more than flesh and bone. 

He watches Will leave from his window. It has begun to rain. It is always raining.

**Author's Note:**

> Send me stuff at [ClickTrackHeart on Tumblr](http://clicktrackheart.tumblr.com/).


End file.
